


Unyielding

by spirrum



Series: Equilibrium [3]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, alternative ending to the Trespasser dlc, shameless fix-it fic, spoilers for the Trespasser dlc
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-15
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-04-20 23:17:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4805942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spirrum/pseuds/spirrum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Solas, var lath vir suledin."</p><p>A different path is taken, consequences be what they will.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unyielding

**Author's Note:**

> I needed fix-it fic, and so I wrote fix-it fic. Let me dream.

“Ready to go?”

Her voice draws him; lifts his eyes. The view of the mountains disappears, their cold, unforgiving elegance replaced with warm eyes curving at the corners, and the knowledge of what he’s been thinking about sits in the gently assuring smile that greets him.

Solas suspects that part of him will always be surprised by how easily her presence settles his concerns.

“I have been ready for some time,” he answers. “You were the one who insisted on saying goodbye to the horses.”

There is no apology in the quirk of her lips as she makes to fasten one of the buckles on her boot, tongue caught between her teeth from the effort. Her attire is a far cry from the trappings provided by the Inquisition’s gold, the simple wool tunic and coat telling no stories of her former status. She looks a traveller now, an elf among many.

Much like he had, once.

“How does it feel?”

Raising herself back up, Ellana shifts the weight of her pack with a small grimace. “That depends what you’re asking about,” she counters, with a quick grin that tells him more than her actual answer. “Being without an arm, or being without my trusty military organization, and its horribly unflattering finery?”

“My concern was for the latter,” Solas answers, but can’t help the glance towards her left arm. Or what remains of it. “But you would tell me if you are in pain?”

He wonders if it might be from his open show of concern, but her eyes look alive when she nods. And it’s been months since she last looked so – unburdened. Granted, he’d been gone for most of them, and the worst of them, at least from how she’d looked when she’d found him, the anchor on the brink of killing her but stubbornly insisting his own burdens were worthy of her heart. That  _he_  was worthy.

That conversation had not gone as he’d thought it would. His own folly, perhaps, for thinking she could be reasoned with. He thinks of the path ahead now, and what he’s set out to do. Her promise to find another way. His acceptance, despite his better judgement, to let her try. And it’s a selfish thing, oh it’s a desperately selfish  _hope_  that somehow she will, despite the odds stacked against her. Against them both.

But’s she’s proven him wrong so many times, he refuses to think he’s made the wrong choice in taking her with him.

“Solas?”

The soft utterance of his name pulls his attention – roots his mind in the present, and not the future that awaits, whatever it entails. Two years, and she says it like he’s never been anyone else. But then, to her he has only ever been Solas, even if his duty requires him to be someone else. It’s his time to bear the mantle now, though she’s discarded hers.

He wonders if her presence will help him remember who he is, or make him forget.

“Come on,” she says, giving his fingers a tug. That she knows where his thoughts have gone is evident in the way her simile falters. She still worries he’ll leave, he knows. Worries that he’ll decide she’s a hindrance he can’t afford, and proceed without her. “There’s a lot of world to save between yours and mine, and we’re wasting daylight.”

She’s usually the one for impulsive gestures, but he’s the one who draws her close now; lifts her chin to catch her mouth, a gratitude in the kiss he can’t hope to convey with words. She’d vowed to redeem him; to save the world that, for all its faults, had made her. To save his, though he knows both to be impossible.

_And yet._

Pulling back, it’s to tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear. Her smile doesn’t falter now.

“You are certain this is what you want?” Killing him would be easier. He’d told her so himself. The path he walks will change him, and he has to ask, despite the selfish heart that makes him want to keep her at his side.

“My most ambitious undertaking yet,” she says, fingers tightening around his. “Doesn’t mean I’m not going to try. After all, saving worlds is what I do. Just because I’m no longer the Inquisitor doesn’t change that.”

Solas can only shake his head. “Your determination will never cease to amaze me, vhenan.”

Surprisingly, that makes her laugh. “That’s what I’m hoping for. Now  _come on_.”

He watches her take the first step. The bounce of her hair catches the pale golden light of the sun. A rare glimpse of beauty, in this broken world. Surety sits in the lift of her chin, and confidence despite the missing arm; the mark that is no longer there. But still she shines, spirit brighter than any he’s ever known.

When he moves to follow, Solas wonders just whose path he is truly walking.


End file.
